Sienna’s voice.
The shove was not visible, but the intent was unmistakable.
Detective Moss listened in silence, then removed her glasses and rubbed the bridge of her nose.
‘Mrs. Vale,’ she said carefully, ‘for your safety, we need him to believe you did not survive until we have warrants in place.’
Mara looked at Julian.
Julian did not like it. She saw that immediately. His protective anger filled the room like thunder.
‘No,’ he said. ‘She has been through enough.’
Mara placed one hand over her belly.
Celeste’s heartbeat pulsed steadily from the monitor.
‘He will run,’ Mara said.
Detective Moss nodded once. ‘He may. Especially if he learns the claim is being investigated.’
‘Then let him think he won,’ Mara said.
Julian turned toward her. ‘Mara.’
She met his eyes. They were the color of storm clouds over the river.
‘I have spent eight years letting him decide what people believe about me,’ she said. ‘Not anymore.’
So they let Adrian plan a funeral.
The empty casket was his idea. He claimed he needed closure. He chose white roses because they photographed well against dark wood. He selected Saint Bartholomew’s Chapel because the aisle was long and the ceilings were high, the kind of place where grief could look expensive.
He wrote a statement about mental health and private suffering.
He invited reporters.
That detail told Mara everything.
Adrian did not want to mourn her. He wanted the city to watch him survive her.
From her hospital bed, Mara watched parts of his interview on Julian’s tablet. Adrian stood outside the Glass House in a charcoal coat, eyes red but dry.
‘Mara was the love of my life,’ he told the camera. ‘I only wish she had let me help her.’
Mara turned away before he finished.
Julian switched off the tablet.
‘I will stop this now,’ he said.
‘No.’
‘You do not owe anyone a performance.’
‘It isn’t a performance.’ Mara’s voice was weak, but it did not shake. ‘It is a record.’
The day before the funeral, her condition changed.
Celeste’s heartbeat dipped twice in one hour.
The room filled with doctors. Julian stood back, hands clenched, while Mara gripped the bed rails and tried not to panic.
The obstetrician, Dr. Imani Cole, spoke calmly.
‘Your daughter is under stress. We can wait a little longer, but not much. If the dips continue, we deliver.’
Mara nodded.
After everyone left, Julian sat beside her.
For several minutes, neither spoke.
Finally, he said, ‘Your mother should have told me.’
Mara looked at him.
Pain moved across his face. ‘I do not say that to blame her. I loved Elena when we were young. My family hated her because she had no money and no patience for their rules. They offered her a settlement to disappear. She refused. Then she vanished anyway. I thought she chose to leave me.’
Mara listened as rain tapped against the hospital window.
‘She was proud,’ Julian continued. ‘And I was arrogant. By the time I understood my family might have threatened her, years had passed.’
‘She kept your photo,’ Mara said.
His eyes shone.
‘I looked for her,’ he said. ‘Not well enough. That is the truth. I looked like a young man who believed time would forgive him.’
Mara thought of her
